The Lower Treave Caravan and Camping Park Blog

Monday, 22 March 2010

Have just completed Phase One of the installation of a new Solar Thermal system for the laundry and shower block.

The pipework isn’t particularly pretty, but it had to mate in with the existing stuff and it is functional rather than beautiful. As some of the temperatures in the system are going to be pretty high, then solder is not an option for the solar circuit and the plastic is so much easier and quicker to fit.

The black box with the dials on is the pump station which will pump hot water from the panels on the roof to the thermal store (the big green thing in the picture below). The white cylinder is the expansion tank and the silver coloured bits of pipework with the red, blue and green controls on them are Thermostatic Mixing Valves to make sure you get showers at the right temperature. The blue circulating pump at the bottom will pump the water for the radiators in the loos and showers.

The controls for both the boilers (on the outside wall) and the solar thermal system are on the same panel. The wiring is all in place ready for the final connection. The solar controller will give you a display of how the system is performing.

Phase Two is to position the thermal store (big green thing) in front of this lot and connect it in and then Phase Three is to get the solar panels on to the roof.

Phase Four is when I try to explain to the Calor Gas rep why we're not using quite as much gas this season!

Will keep you posted on progress and how the system performs. I love all this stuff!